The separating of the sheep and goats is a commonly known scene where Jesus comes back and gives judgment to the world. In the simplest understanding of this, those who were good go to the good place and those who were bad go to the bad place. The discussion then shifts to what actually constitutes a person as “good” or “bad”? When compared to the worst person I can think of in history, I am a pretty decent person. A word of caution must be offered here. When we read Matthew 25:31-46 as a recipe for salvation, we enter into a pagan notion that we earn or lose our salvation based on our own merit. We also run the risk of oversimplifying “righteousness” as what we do in these few actions to the poor. A good conversation partner, on this front, would be Jesus’s teachings in the Sermon on the Mount.
The parable found in Matthew 25:31-46 is a good reminder though that when we only pay attention to our “sins of omission” (adultery, dishonesty, bad temper, lying, etc.) we can miss our “sins of commission.” This parable reminds us of our call to engage in bringing about the reality of God’s good creation wherever we go. I’ve heard people debate over who the “least of these” are, as if to say someone in need, “Get out of my way poser! I’m going to someone worse off than you!” What I would like to focus on this week is the attitude and goal we have toward the “least of these.”
David Fitch tells a great story of a church in Toronto that illustrates well how the church needs to be present to the “least of these.” The basic summary of the story is that when the homeless people they were serving were asked how they could provide their ministry better, those who were homeless responded that they wanted to bring something to the table, help set up, and serve the church as well. This runs against how most ministries are set up where the church enters a space and ministers to people.
In the early church, followers of Christ took the call of this passage to recognize Christ in the marginalized, oppressed, and downtrodden around them. When we encounter Christ in the face of the hungry do we give them bread and send them on their way or do we long to be closer to Christ and invite them in? What does it look like for us to be closer to the presence of Christ when we are with the “least of these”?
When we recognize that we are serving Christ himself we shift our mindset from seeing people as a ministry and begin to see them as fellow Sisters and Brothers in God’s Family. We open ourselves to being present to Christ in each person we meet. What can we learn about Christ we make ourselves available to being in his presence in the least of these?
What do you need to receive from Christ found in those who are oppressed and in the margins of our society?
Who are the marginalized and oppressed you struggle to see Christ in the most? Spend time in prayer asking God to give you eyes to see and a heart to love.
What do we miss in Christ when we see people as “a drain on society” or see them as suspicious because of their citizen status?